The state will receive nearly $74,000 in restitution for suppressing the fire that burned two acres of old spruce forest atop Big Spencer Mountain in August, according to a recent press release issued by the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry. A district court judge… Read More

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Anonymous

Responsibility….we will thank you when the final check clears.

Anonymous

I suppose fire and police depts should start bringing credit card machines to every call? I wonder if we will still have to give them taxpayer funds since they are running this game now?

Ben Hutchins

There’s a distinct difference between an accidental fire (e.g. a house fire caused by a hidden electrical fault) and one caused by outright incompetence and/or disregard of regulations. In cases where that difference is especially evident – such as this one – I see no problem with requiring the parties directly and obviously responsible to cover the costs of dealing with their carelessness.

(For precedent elsewhere in the country, I refer you to Arizona Revised Statutes 28-910, which stipulates that anyone willfully ignoring a flood barricade and then needing to be rescued from the waters will be charged for the rescue. This happens fairly often in that flash-flood-prone part of the world; not for nothing is that statute commonly known as the Stupid Motorist Law.)

Anonymous

Don’t make it right. Just saying ACCIDENTS happen and municipalities are becomming money grubbing overbloated monstrousity’s preying on unfortunate happenstance.

Ben Hutchins

There’s nothing accidental about starting an outdoor fire without a permit in a place where a permit is required. If such a fire then goes on to cause a forest fire, that’s not happenstance, it’s an illustration of why permits are required in the first place.

Anonymous

Wish there was some clarification here . . . was Coers associated with the construction crew working on the mountain at the time . . . or was he just a hiker/camper who used the construction material to light a fire . . . assuming here that he was with the company which makes one wonder why the company wasn’t being ordered to pay.